The large one is $29 and small $16. That won't break the bank but......

in true cheapskate fashion I didn't want to pay that. I would rather save my pennies and buy some other awesome stuff from there that I can't make on my own.

You wanna see how I made mine?

Teehee I love this stuff!

Enter:

4 embroidery hoops

Forgive the bad bad blurry shot but the 6 " hoops were $.99

and well you can see the 8" were $1.19

I took apart each hoop and started playing with the 4 small pieces (there are two pieces per hoop if you have never played with these guys before). I placed them inside one another and moved them around until they looked like this.

I wanted to make sure I could get them to look right before I messed with staining them.

My original thought was that after I stained them I would just attempt to hot glue them together.

I decided I would line up and interlock the two tightening thingies to hold them together fairly well and then glue them together.

Then I slapped on some gray wood stain with a sponge brush(this is really porous and thin wood so it soaks it up quick). I wanted a little rustic look so I literally slapped it on. Then I ended up moving them around from place to place in the house and the garage for two weeks until I found time to play again but seriously this is a super quick project if your not me;)

Since I had two weeks to think about how I wanted to keep these balls together I decided to steer clear of the hot glue idea and tack them together instead. Literally!

Seriously this wood is so soft that the thumb tacks went in really easy. No they don't go all the way through two layers of hoop but they do hold it together just fine! Woohoo...no messy stringy hot glue!

I originally thought I would buy these and take off the tightening thingies but I don't mind how they look with them(I stained over the metal too so they don't stand out as much). I think if you have ever stuck with me enough to read any of my posts you know by now that I am a sloppy, messy, or even a half *** crafter. You will find no attempt at perfection in any project at this house. We are just typically excited to get r done!

Don't laugh at me...I did move these to three different places to photograph them;) I never feel like I can get a pretty shot in this rent house because often the back drop includes apple wallpaper, peeling linoleum or 80's shutters;)

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comments:

Amazing!! How creative and clever to come up with this and I have a feeling we will be seeing these all over blogland now. :-) Love the title of your post too...lol! Thanks so much for sharing this with us at Inspiration Friday this week~Vanessa

love the spheres...great idea! Love that you call yourself a half*** crafter LOL. i think i may fall into that catagory as well. I like only projects that are DONE in one day or less! Will continue to follow!Maggie @ TheHellonHeelsHousewife.blogspot.com

This project is awesome! I totally thought they were metal!! It would be super cool if would come by today to enter my giveaway for a $50 Lowe's gift card and to link up to my very first party! http://thespacebetweenblog.wordpress.com/2012/01/31/imagine-the-impossibilities-link-party-1/Karah @ thespacebetweenblog

Awesome! I just saw these spheres online and immediately starting thinking about DIY'ing them with embroidery hoops...and here you are with the embroidery hoop idea too! Thanks for posting this - now I'm sure I can make them work! :)

I don't know....this is perhaps just the COOLEST craft idea I've seen all year. And here I thought I'd have to try to figure out how in the world to make those out of those strips of metal with the holes without looking dorky and homemade. LOL! This is WAY better...yay and thank you so much!

Really cool project! I thought your first picture was what you were trying to DIY. I have a bunch of embroidery hoops that I got from an estate sale, and this is a great way to use some of them. Thanks for sharing!

Grand idea! Not generally a maker/lover of thinkgs to dust : ), but will do these!Especially LOVE the tacks...they give it the steampunk uuumpf that's so popular, never mind the fact they help hold it together.

This is a wonderful idea! I was just eyeing some spheres at the home store and thought to myself that I knew I could make them. lol I never even thought about embroidery hoops and I'm a stitcher!! Thank you for sharing!

I like them a lot! I'm going for a beachy feel in the house. I'm thinking I could bleach the wood. I've been wanting to bleach something that wasn't big, like a piece of furniture. I'm going to give them a try. ;)

This is so awesome!! I just bought 6 embroidery hoops today so that I can teach some girls at my church how to embroider. They are like eight years old so lessons won't last more than a couple weeks...and I was wondering what I was going to do with all the hoops after that. Now I'm not wondering- I'm making one of these! :D